I had been startled. I had expected to be close-chained. She seemed amused, regarding my astonishment.

"You will not escape," she smiled.

"No, Mistress," I said.

Then I looked down. I did not wish to leave the women's tent.

Ena went to a chest, opened it, and drew forth a folded piece of striped rep-cloth, a rectangle some two and a half by four feet.

"Stand," she said.

I did so.

"Lift your arms," she said.

I did so, and to my pleasure, she wrapped the piece of cloth about me, snugly, and fastened it with a pin behind my right shoulder blade. She then fastened it again, with anther pin, behind my right hip.

"Lower your arms," she said.

I did so, and stood straight before her.

"You are pretty," she said. "Now run along and see the camp."

"Thank you, Mistress," I cried, and turned, and sped from the tent. I wandered about the camp. It was a war camp, lying in a remote, hilly area, covered with trees. I supposed it to be somewhere in the realm of Ar, perhaps to its northeast, among the foothills of the Voltai range. It was a typical Gorean war camp, though small. It had its compound where tarns were hobbled, and its cooking and washing sheds. There were many warriors about, perhaps a hundred or more, the men of Rask of Treve, and perhaps a hundred or more, lovely ones, in brief work tunics, busying themselves with their tasks, cooking, cleaning leather, polishing shields. Treve, I knew, was, nominally, at war with several cities. Strife is common among Gorean cities, each tending to be belligerent and suspicious of others. Rask of Treve, in his way, as other raiders of Treve, carried the war to the enemy. Earlier, I knew, he had despoiled the fields and attacked the caravans of Ko-ro-ba. He was now in the realm of Ar. He was a bold tarnsman indeed. I expected Marlenus of Ar, its Ubar, said to be the Ubar of Ubars, would give much to know the location of this small, palisaded camp. I enjoyed the smells of the camp, and its sounds. I watched two warriors practicing with their swift, short blades on a square of sand. The ringing of the metal excited and frightened me, the swiftness and cruelty of it. How brave men must be, I thought, to stand so to one another, so close, in combat so near, face to face, wrist to wrist, eye to eye, short, vicious, sharpened ringing blade to short, vicious, sharpened ringing blade. I could not have done this. I would have cried out and fled. What could a woman be but the prize of such men? For a moment I wished myself back on Earth where there was little for a man to do which could not be done as well, or better, by a woman. But then, as I watched the warriors at their practice, something deep in me did not wish this. Something deep in me, primitive, helpless, and vulnerable, rejoiced that I stood not on Earth, but on Gor, where there were such men. Suddenly my legs felt very bare, and my arms. I was suddenly frightened. What if they should finish their sport, and turn to look upon me, and command me to serve them? Would I not, as a woman, have to give them immediate response? Could I have helped myself, kept myself from yielding immediately and completely to them? When such men command, what could a woman do?

"Ho!" cried one of the warriors, and their exercises were finished. I turned and fled away.

I went to examine the palisade about the camp. It was some twelve feet high and of sharpened logs.

I traced its interior perimeter.

I put my fingers and hands on the logs, which had been smoothed, and were closely fitted together. I looked up at the points, so far above my head. I could not have scaled the wall. I was closed within.

I continued to walk about the inside wall. I avoided this only where the tarn compound adjoined it.

Soon I had arrived at the gate.

It, too, was of logs, though here they were separated somewhat. It was a double gate, with, in effect, log bars. It was shut, two beams in brackets, chained, locking it. To my surprise I saw that there was another gate, though of solid logs, beyond that one, and that the camp was ringed, actually, with a double palisade. The exterior palisade had a catwalk, for defending the wall. The interior palisade, on the side of the camp, was without a catwalk. I was angry. The exterior wall permitted them defense. The interior wall, high and smooth, a quite effective barrier, served well to keep their slaves within. I was furious. "You will not escape," had said Ena.

"Girls may not linger by the gate," said a guard.

"Yes, Master," I said, and turned away.

How furious I was!

I continued to walk about the wall. At one point I found a tiny door, no more than eighteen inches in height. It was such that one man, at a time, could crawl through it. And it, too, was secured, fastened shut with two heavy chains and locks. And it, too, was guarded.

I saw that I could not, even by standing on the chains, remotely approach the top of the palisade. I imagined myself standing on my toes and stretching my arms and fingers. My fingers would have still been several feet beneath the points. It was so futile!

I was well imprisoned within.

"Move on, Girl," said the guard.

"Yes, Master," I said, and again turned away.

"You will not escape," had said Ena.

Tomorrow I, Elinor Brinton, would be collared!

I then began to walk through the camp. I saw the tents and the fires, and the men talking, and the girls about their tasks. I hated men. They made us work! Why did they not do their own cooking, and polish their own leather, and go to the stream or the washing shed and wash their own clothes? They did not do so because they did not wish to do so. They made girls do their work! I hated men. They dominated us and exploited us!

I found, in one place in the camp, a grassy area, on a slight hill. There was a metal ring there, near the top of the slight hill. It was fixed in a heavy stone, buried level with the grass.

In another place, I found a horizontal pole, itself set on two pairs of poles, leaning together and lashed at the top. It was, I gathered, a pole for hanging meat. Oddly enough, there was also an iron ring, set in a stone, buried in the ground, beneath the center of the horizontal pole. Off to one side, in an open area there was a small iron box, a square of some three feet in dimension. In the front of the box there was a small iron door, with two slits in it. One, near the top, was about seven inches in width and about a half inch in height; the other, its top formed by a rectangular opening in the bottom of the door, its bottom formed by the iron floor of the box, was about a foot wide and two inches in height. The door could be closed with two heavy, flat, sliding bolts, and locked with two padlocks. I wondered what could be kept in such a box.

I continued to walk about the camp.

In one place I found a long, low shed, formed of heavy logs. It was windowless. Its heavy plank door was locked with two hasps and staples, secured by two heavy padlocks. I supposed it a storage shed.

My steps now, inadvertently, took me toward the center of the camp. I stood before a large, low tent of scarlet canvas, suspended on eight poles. Inside, through the opened tent flap, I could see the scarlet canvas was lined with silk. It was a low tent, and only near its center could a man walk upright. Inside, in a brass pan, there was a small fire of coals. Over the coals, on a tripod, there was, warming, a small metal wine bowl. Warriors of Treve, I had heard, had a fondness for warm wines. I supposed that Rask of Treve might have his wine so. It seemed strange to me to think of such tarnsmen, such brutal, wild men, caring for such a small pleasantry. Too, I had heard, they were fond of combing the hair of their slave girls. Cities and men, I thought, are so strange, so different. I suspected there were few men as fierce and terrible as those of Treve, dreaded throughout Gor, and yet they enjoyed their wine warmed and were fond of so simple a thing as smoothing the hair of a girl. Inside, the tent was floored with heavy, soft rugs, from Tor and Ar, perhaps the booty of caravan raids. And, within, from extensions of certain of the tent poles, there hung, on hooks, burning tharlarion-oil lamps of brass. It was a bit chilly tonight. And it was growing dark now. The interior of the tent seemed inviting, redly warm and dark. I put the thought from my mind that I wished I was within that tent. I wondered what it would be like to lie within such a tent, naked and collared, on its soft furs, in the light of the small fire, the tent flaps tied shut, completely at the mercy of its master. Against its far wall I could see great chests, heavy and bound with iron, filled doubtless with a raider's abundant booty, gems and golden wire, and necklaces and coins, and pearls, and jewelries and bracelets and bangles, set perhaps with precious stones, which might serve to adorn the limbs of exquisite female slaves. Much booty was there. And I reminded myself that I, too, as much as any coin or precious cup in such a chest, or in this entire camp, was booty. I, too, was booty. I wondered, too, if those chests might contain the light, precious chains of silver and gold, wrought by slavers so cunningly, to hold a girl in given positions, while she was subdued at a master's leisure. I trembled. And I wondered, too, if they might contain nose rings, and if one would be put on me. I shuddered. "Whose tent is this?" I asked a passing slave girl.